"But I must tell you," she urged. "There is something I must tell you. It was my fault--everything that happened ... about ...
about Feathers. You made me half mad, I think, and--and it was I who asked him to take me away. It was I who asked him--he was much too honorable ... I--I can"t bear that--that you should blame him."
"I blame myself--for everything," but his eyes searched her face with pa.s.sionate jealousy.
"You said you hated me once," he reminded her morosely. "Marie Celeste, when did--when did you begin to care again?"
She looked away from him. Somehow she could not meet his eyes.
There was a knowledge in her heart which she knew must always be a secret from him--the knowledge of her queer, inexplicable love for Feathers.
It was still there in her heart, and always would be, she knew, but already time had begun to soften and change it, as time subtly changes the outline and coloring of a picture without altering its beauty in the smallest degree--perhaps even adding to it.
"I saw a photograph of you--in ... in his rooms," she whispered.
"And I knew then ... that whatever happened ... I could not go."
It was the truth, neither more nor less; the old loyalty and allegiance had called her back--perhaps the old love, who knows?
Chris" arms tightened about her. Three times he had been so near to losing her, twice by death, and once--by something that would have been so infinitely worse!
He drew Marie down to him, and kissed her with pa.s.sionate thankfulness.
"He saved your life for me--twice!" he said.
It was an all-sufficient answer to any doubt or suspicion that might still linger in his heart.
L"ENVOI
CHRIS took Marie abroad immediately, and for a year they stayed away from England and its many poignant memories.
They wintered in the South of France, and spent the late spring in Switzerland.
"I should like to take you to Italy," Chris said one day, but Marie shook her head.
"No--not Italy--I never want to go there."
He wondered a little at the time, and it was only some days afterwards that he understood, and the old jealousy of his friend that still slumbered deep in his heart stirred.
He knew that Feathers" death had left a mark on Marie"s life that neither time nor the greatness of his love could ever quite efface; sometimes still, its memory would rise up like a great black wave and overwhelm her.
And yet she was happy--happier than she had ever been in her life, even though she felt she was looking at life and the beauties of the world through the sad eyes of a bitter experience.
It was a surprise to Chris when one day she told him that she would like to go back to England. It was early June then, and they were at Lucerne, and the snow was beginning to melt on the mountain sides, and little bright colored flowers were springing up everywhere.
The desire to return had often been in Chris" heart, but not for the world would he have said so. Marie was everything in his life now--he could not bear her out of his sight.
"Tired of Lucerne?" he asked.
"No--but I think I would like to go home."
"London in June is appalling," Chris said. "Why not stay on here a month or two longer and then go up to Scotland. You"ve never been to Scotland, Marie Celeste?"
He watched her with moody eyes as he made the deliberate suggestions. Was she going to shrink from that too, on account of its memories, as she had done from Italy? But to his relief she agreed.
"Yes--I should like that."
He caught her hand and raised it to his lips.
"Scotland be it then," he said happily. "I know a ripping little place, right up in the mountains at a place called ..." He rubbed his head boyishly. "Dashed if I can remember the name," he said.
Marie laughed.
"I shall be happy enough, whatever its name is," she told him.
But it was October before they finally went back, and the heather was paling, and the sunsets were wonderful when at last they settled down amongst the mountains and the silence.
The little house in the hills was all that Chris had claimed for it, and the windows of Marie"s rooms looked right out on to a mountain gorge, and a little noisy stream of water.
"Happy, Marie Celeste?" Chris asked one evening, coming into the room and finding her at the window, her face rather grave in the sunset light.
He put an arm round her waist. "Quite happy?" he asked anxiously.
She turned her face, stood on tiptoe and kissed him.
"I was thinking about Aunt Madge!--I wonder if she knows that--that everything"s all right."
"Is it--all right?" he asked, jealously.
She looked away from him to the wonderful sunset.
"Don"t you know that it is?" she asked.
There was a little silence, and her thoughts went wistfully to Feathers.
He had always said she would be happy some day--she was happy now.
But it seemed impossible that he was really dead--she could never think of him as dead but always as she had known him, so full of health and vigor, and cheeriness, and with the old faithful look in his eyes. She gave a quick sigh and Chris said anxiously:
"Have you got everything you want in the world, Marie Celeste?"
She laughed and blushed, rubbing her cheek against his coat.
"I think perhaps I shall have--some day," she said.
He held her at arm"s length.
"What do you mean, Marie Celeste?"